Lessons that last

First graders huddle around a table in an Everett, Wash., church basement. They form balls of multicolored clay into human figures while Marjolynn Brasseur, a Life­Wise Academy teacher, watches. “Now breathe on them!” she says as the kids giggle and blow on their clay figures.

Volunteers hand out Bibles, open to a picture of Adam and Eve, and without missing a beat, the teacher begins telling the story of God breathing life into the first man. Before she finishes, volunteers are already passing out lunches—strawberries, carrots, and chicken hot dogs wrapped in freshly baked biscuits.

While they eat, the kids watch a Claymation-style video depicting God creating the first man and his wife. When the narrator says, “and God breathed life,” a 6-year-old boy yells out, “Just like we did!”

The 40-minute program moves quickly, beginning with the half-mile bus ride from school. As the LifeWise bus pulls away from Emerson Elementary, the kids sing, “My God is so big, so strong and so mighty. There’s nothing my God cannot do!”

From there, the class runs through a Bible story, Scripture memorization, discussions of Jesus, the concept of being created in God’s image, and the value of human life. When the teacher asks, “Why did God create us?” the same boy blurts out, “For His glory!”

Less than an hour later, the kids file back onto the shuttle and return to public school—an afternoon of Sunday school squeezed into a lunch break.

Supporters hail LifeWise as a long-overlooked opportunity to make Biblical education accessible to public school students. Critics call it a dangerous encroachment on the separation of church and state.

LifeWise insists its program, based on “release time” policies, is legal.

In 1952, the Supreme Court ruled that parents must be allowed to take their children off campus for religious instruction, a decision that led to “release time religious instruction” policies across the nation. Parents have long used these policies to take kids out of school for special religious services, like Yom Kippur. And some Catholic churches have used it to offer midday classes for high school students. But it was not until recently that evangelical Christians leveraged the idea to offer Bible-based education during school hours.

LifeWise founder Joel Penton set out to develop a replicable, scalable program that could be integrated into the public school day. In 2019, LifeWise Academy launched its first off-campus, Bible-education program at a school in Ohio. Since then, the movement has expanded to more than 800 schools in 30 states.

“There are 90,000 schools in the nation, and we think every one of them, every one of the 50 million students, should have access to Bible education,” Penton said.

But the program’s rapid success has also brought opposition.

When the Everett LifeWise Academy, the first chapter in Washington state, began in early 2025, it immediately drew the ire of local skeptics worried about the encroachment of evangelical Christianity in public schools.

At a school board meeting in July, Charles Adkins, an elected school board member, read a statement lambasting the district for allowing LifeWise to operate. “We cannot allow this religious brainwashing and bullying of non-Christian and LGBT kids to take place when we can do something to stop it,” he said. “We must do everything we possibly can to protect our kids.”

Parents and a Lutheran pastor also urged the board to shut down the program, arguing that it would take away from recreational time and create unfair privilege for participating students. Several community members expressed a concern that LifeWise’s Bible lessons, with their teachings about created gender distinctions, would harm children and disrupt the public school’s inclusive culture.

LifeWise uses a curriculum developed by The Gospel Project, published by LifeWay Christian Resources—an organization affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention.

Keith Comer, an Ohio computer programmer, created a website to help organize the Washington opposition. He objects to LifeWise’s “hateful” message and worries about its effect on young children. “It’s completely wrong to say nobody is capable of being a good person unless you have accepted Jesus,” he said.

Penton says LifeWise’s critics are loud but few. For the most part, parents have been supportive, with some elementary schools enrolling up to 90% of their students.

Cindy Lien-Kessner, a grandmother who volunteers with the Everett program, is not surprised by the pushback. “The Scripture very clearly says that those who want to live a godly life will suffer persecution. When you are doing God’s work, the devil gets mad.”

The Everett School District maintains its statement that it neither partners with, endorses, nor opposes religious organizations like LifeWise. It provides strict parameters for the organization to follow: Lessons must take place off campus, not interfere with instructional time, and, most importantly, be offered only to students who have their parent or guardian’s consent.

The school also forbids LifeWise from giving students take-home materials unless they are sealed in an envelope kept in their backpacks. Consequently, this LifeWise provides two sets of Bibles: one for home and one for class.

The average LifeWise program costs $50,000 per year, including expenses for food and some paid staff, all of which is covered by churches and local donors.

Everett’s LifeWise program co-director, Darcie Hammer, said local churches and supporters have been generous with their time and resources. The Assembly of God church where the program meets, donates the use of its building every week. Another church donated two shuttles to transport kids.

Hammer said one day an older man drove to her house, gave her $4,000 worth of gold coins, and told her to “go buy tires” for the two shuttles.

A team of volunteers, mostly retired teachers and grandparents, shows up every week to set up the classroom, make lunches, and help the teachers enthusiastically greet students when they get off the bus.

“We are intentional Christian grandparents,” said Earl Radford, a retired children’s church pastor who spends his Wednesday mornings making lunch for the kids. “I didn’t want to sit around and watch TV in retirement. I want to be purposeful.”

Hammer and her co-director, Sarah Sweeny, met in their kids’ elementary school parking lot. Sweeny overheard Hammer asking a teacher if she knew of any other Christian parents in the school who would be interested in praying. Sweeny introduced herself, and the two moms spent the next year walking around the schoolyard, praying. When they learned about the LifeWise program, they knew it was an answer to those prayers. Now they have 53 students enrolled.

Sweeny recognizes that many Christians are choosing to homeschool or send their children to Christian schools, but as a former public school teacher, she is passionate about staying involved.

“Nine out of 10 kids are in public schools, so if we want to reach our youth and be a light for them, we have such an opportunity to do that,” she said.